Meet Jiminy....

A few weeks ago, the girls found a cricket in the yard.  At least I think that's what it is.  I always thought crickets were black and made that annoying sound all the time that so many people love.  I like it too, when it's outside and I can come inside to get away from it.  We've had several crickets make their way inside the house only to be awakened by them at 2:00 in the morning and then try to find out where that annoying noise is coming from.

Anyway, this little guy...or girl...I don't know how to tell the anatomy of a cricket, nor do I want to know....was green and didn't make a peep.  It wasn't a grasshopper, so we just said it was a cricket and the girls of course named him Jiminy.

The first couple days, his jar was only filled with grass.  Brad kept telling us we needed to give him/her some water.  So the girls and I decided to do some research and figure out what they ate.  I thought it would be a fun project for the girls.  So we Googled it and found out that they like to eat bread crumbs and fruit as well as fruit and vegetable peelings.  It also said they like to eat other bugs, but we caught some flies in the house and he didn't eat those. 

The site also said that you shouldn't put standing water in their cage because "crickets have a very small brain and will drown in a very small body of water."  Good to know.  It suggested soaking a cotton ball in water and placing it in the cage. 

They also like to bury themselves in sand and climb on sticks.  After reading all this, we made up a new environment for him by dumping out the grass, adding some sand, sticks, grass, feeding him some bread crumbs and giving him a soaked cotton ball.

He sucked on the cotton ball forever he must have been thirsty!  We also eyed him nibbling on some bread crumbs also. 

It was a fun learning experience for the girls.  They fought over who got to give Jiminy a new cotton ball or give him bread crumbs.  Unfortunately Jiminy is no longer with us.  In the busyness of these last couple of weeks, he was forgotten.

Now the girls have bug cages from Walgreens.  As a result of the dry weather, bugs have been very scarce around here and all they have been able to capture are flies.  The kind that are huge and very slow for whatever reason.  They catch about 5 at a time then bring their cage in the house only to discover that the flies somehow manage to crawl out of the cage!  Fun times!  Fun times!